1 week Ago By [email protected] (Ralph Maraj)
Four months ago, I called on the US electorate to not let Donald Trump into the White House again. “For humanity’s sake,” I said, “don’t do it!” Well, they have done it. With eyes wide open.
According to reports, voters heard Trump say he intended to use military force against political opponents; fire thousands of career public servants; round up and deport millions of immigrants; demolish the independent Department of Justice, and abandon America’s allies abroad. As Lisa Lerer wrote in The New York Times, “America now stands on the precipice of an authoritarian style of governance never before seen in its 248-year history.” This election has “set the nation on a precarious course that no one can fully foresee”, says the paper’s editorial board.
Questions abound. With the return of Trump’s “America First” isolationism, will the United States no longer be, as Barack Obama said, “the one indispensable nation in world affairs” seeking and playing a role no other country can? What kind of international environment would that create? Would there be global chaos? Would autocracy rise and thrive, bringing joy to Trump’s dictator friends like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un, both eager to see Trump end US support for Ukraine in its war with Russia? European nations must be especially concerned. Will Trump also withdraw the US from NATO, destroying the transatlantic alliance, critical for countering that emerging autocratic group—China, Russia, Iran and North Korea.
In 2021, I insisted “Europe must emerge as a global force in its own right”. I asked, “What if, heaven forbid, Trump returns after US presidential elections?! Europe must prepare to shoulder a leading responsibility for global stability.” Nature abhors a vacuum.
Again, in February this year, with US elections approaching, I said Europe must “hurry up”. I asked, “what if, within a year, Russia overwhelms Ukraine and Trump undermines NATO? Would Europe have the capacity and global influence to deal with the fallout?” Indeed, at a recent Munich Conference, European leaders accepted “how slowly they have reacted to the new realities”. Now they must make haste.
They must become capable of leading the western world, if necessary. Together, EU nations constitute the world’s second largest economy and have the world’s second largest military. In consonance with the EU’s Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) they must continue to “deepen defence cooperation” among member states.
Twenty-five member states joined, aiming for “swift and seamless movement of military personnel and assets throughout the EU” and a “full spectrum of defence capabilities for national and multinational missions”. Questions now also hang over Trump’s approach to the Indo Pacific, which has emerged as “the world’s economic and geopolitical centre of gravity”. A 2022 White House report says this region is home to half the world’s people, nearly two-thirds of the world’s economy, and seven of the world’s largest militaries.
It is key to global industries including manufacturing, technology, finance, energy, agriculture, fishing and tourism. The Indo Pacific has four of the world’s largest economies: the US, China, India and Japan. Additionally, the ten nations of the ASEAN bloc together constitute global economic leadership alongside those four countries.
In 2022, US trade with the Indo-Pacific reached US$2 trillion. As I said earlier this year, “Today, whoever controls the Indo Pacific rules the world. And a fight is on.
” Under Biden, a pervasive US presence grew in this region to check China’s expansionism. Will this continue under Trump? Will he continue Biden’s three-way defence pact involving the US, Japan and South Korea? Four years ago, he demanded South Korea pay vastly more for US troops on its soil and threw doubt on the US/Japan Mutual Defence Treaty which has grown stronger. Will he now stop sending the most advanced Tomahawk cruise missiles to Japan and remove the Marine Corps regiment Biden established on Okinawa capable of fighting from small islands and destroying ships at sea? What is to become of the US Marines the Australian government hosts in the north of the country? Will Washington’s new security agreement with Papua New Guinea vanish? Will a visiting-forces agreement between the Philippines and the US military survive, whereby the Pentagon now has access to multiple airfields and naval bases in the Philippines, lessening the need for aircraft carriers that could be targeted by China’s long-range missiles and submarines.
And what will become of a revitalised Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) with the US, Japan, Australia and India for a free and open Indo Pacific and AUKUS with the US, UK and Australia to help Canberra acquire nuclear-powered submarines to counter Beijing. Will Trump continue a major defence partnership with India started by Biden? Questions abound. In the Middle East as well.
With Trump victorious, will Benjamin Netanyahu now have unrestrained licence to escalate Israel’s war with Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran? And will Iran then find support against Israel and the US from its autocratic allies China, Russia and North Korea? Is humanity’s final confrontation closer than ever before? Is Trump’s return to the White House that step which takes us to the end of our civilisation, our story? —Ralph Maraj.
